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Pretty dang happy how this turned out, I'll be changing my forging of the next on to start above ACM to get a more wattered pattern but for my first time I'd say it's pretty good.

Took a little family portrait at the local guild meeting yesterday.

Well, it has been a few years since I've been on the forum, but here is my latest. The blade is a bad ladder pattern, mokume gane bolsters, mosaic pins with stabilized ambonia burl handle. Thoughts?

And just to add for posterity: This should be taken into consideration when selecting alloys to forge weld together. Do not combine an air hardening steel and a water hardening steel, for example. There are of course exceptions (like possibly an oil hardening steel as the core of san mai, with a water hardening alloy around it). Just make sure it is considered before mixing alloys, that is my point.

Looks like a blotchy etch to me, no biggie. As for the plate, most people use aluminum for the higher heat transfer rate (I got a pair of 6x11x1 off eBay for ~$60), but for the kind of volume we do steel is totally fine. I leave half an inch between blades, and I wouldn't worry about the tang sticking out. It'll harden anyway with air-hardening steels, might warp, though.

It's definitely beautiful but looks like I might have some graphite, a bit of a bummer to say the least. Did the roast this weekend, I'll start forging this today 385 grams, old files and a bit of ball bearings to top the charge off, hard to guess exact carbon % since the files. Surface Dendrites are considerably larger than my last puck.

... she has not been to the hairdresser for a long time!

Past year has been busy, haven’t had tons of time for knives, but got this one done Old Nicholson file so probably w2 And curly pear handle, first time i ever tried a coke bottle shape besides a few minor issues, less than the previous knives though. onto the next !

If it helps you at all, i too am not the most mechanically inclined and a couple weeks ago i was dead set in buying a forge, but after reading a TON of posts in here, it was pretty clear that building one was the way to go. Not only would it be the same price or cheaper (even with having to buy a small welder and economy drill press) but id get a better forge, a better understanding and it would be easier to repair. Plus I’d be 2 tools up lol. anyway my point it even though i was dead set on buying a forge, a lot of patience and reading helped me from making a hefty mistake. Your cas

That's one of the pretend-forges, sorry. Not familiar with the other one you mentioned.

The question should not even need to be asked. Where are you located? If you don't want it I'll come and get it, no matter how far I have to travel. I'll even bring you the forge building materials that you will need for your first gas forge.

The hawk is approx 19" long x 8" with a 2" cutting edge. The main body is made from 8 bars of twisted pattern weld with approx 20 layers in each bar with a 400 layer cutting edge. The smoke bowl is made from 9 bars of twisted pattern weld arranged in a 3x3 cube and worked to shape then hard silver soldered to the main body. Many Thanks to Alan for supplying the Curly Maple haft which I have treated with Aqua Fortis to bring out the figure and banding. The wooden beads are Californian Buckeye and Redwood and the smoke hole stopper is Buffalo horn.